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Re: Recorders

Author: Ken Shaw ★2017
Date: 2010-09-20 02:46

James -

I play lots of recorder - probably more than clarinet these days.

Recorder needs no embouchure (and you shouldn't squeeze your lips together). The tone is pretty much built into the instrument.

You put the tip of the instrument between your lips and close them just enough to prevent leaking.

Start blowing from zero. Relax, beginning with your buttocks and up to the top of your head. Bring the recorder to your lips (i.e., don't tuck your chin down) and blow gently, letting your cheeks puff out slightly. On a decent recorder, you'll blow just enough to bring the tone up to pitch. Then experiment with slightly more breath pressure to find the most resonant point. It takes practice to find that and stay on it.

Find how little finger pressure you can use. Without keys to operate, just the weight of your fingertips on the holes is enough.

The basic tongue stroke is like the French-accent pronunciation of "th" (as in "that"). The area just back of the tip of your tongue should touch the ridge behind your upper teeth, in a cross between "th" and "z."

As to instruments, there's lots of garbage out there, particularly on eBay. The ONLY ones worth having are the plastic Yamahas, which are head and shoulders above the rest. If you have anything else, give them away and get the Yamahas. Even the colored plastic school sopranos and altos are quite good at $7.50 and $20, and the "300" series, at $22 for the soprano and $40 for the alto, are better than anything you'll find at 10 times the price.

As a clarinetist, I'm most comfortable with a thumb rest, even on the soprano. Split about 1/3 longitudinally off a wine bottle cork, wrap a sheet of coarse sandpaper (maybe 220 grit) around the body of the recorder, grit-side-out, and sand the split side of the bigger piece of cork until it fits the body. Cut about a third of the length of the cork off and glue the remaining part to the body, so that the bottom end of the cork is even with or slightly below the bottom edge of the hole for the right index finger.

Good luck. Join the Yahoo recorder group at http://launch.groups.yahoo.com/group/recorder/.

Ken Shaw

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